Monday, August 17, 2015

Denier weirdness: WUWT makes a foray into celestial cycles

Well, well, well. It had to happen sooner or later I suppose. Anthony Watts has added astrology (or as good as) to the weird and weirder articles he promotes (archived here, latest here). He tried to wriggle out a little bit by writing at the top of his article:

[Note, I don’t necessarily agree with the conclusion this publication, as it smacks of barycentrism, which I don’t give any credence to, but it does discuss some other concepts, and I thought it might make for an interesting and entertaining discussion – Anthony]

Even if Anthony had a year to analyze and dissect each piece...(he couldn't tell if it would)... stand the harsh light of public exposure.

Here's an excerpt from his astrology article, which was from his guest Brian T. Johnston:

It is demonstrated that the fundamental economic cycles of the world are based upon the cycles of the planets as is the timing and magnitude of the sunspot cycle and the also the changes in the earth’s climate which are at the foundation of the world’s economic cycles. It also shows that even though all of these cycles are linked the cycles of the sun are not the causes of the world’s economic cycles, but rather the cycles are driven by the changes in the electromagnetic climate of the solar system that appear to be associated with the interactions of the planets.

I'll skip all the middle bits, and all the drawings of sine curves and triangles, and jump right to the end:

As a final observation the people have always looked to the sky to try to figure out why changes are occurring on the earth. Until the present time it has been nearly impossible to correlate any astronomical events with events on the earth. Now we can see that indeed the planets affect events on the earth in an extremely profound way. The Cattle Cycle drives most of the other economic cycles of the world and the stresses placed upon the system result in wars, famine and disease. All of these changes may be ameliorated by being able to predict what these changes will be in the future and to adjust the various markets to better handle the cosmic changes which are at the foundation of the entire system.

His cattle cycle, by the way, had to do with beef prices and stock numbers - which are affected by earthly factors rather than celestial ones (see here and here).

What is most enlightening, I'm sure you'll agree, is the astrological circuit diagram that Brian T. Johnston kindly provided:

Ain't it beautiful.

References and further reading

I found some other gems from Brian T. Johnston, which you'll find equally awe-inspiring. I'm only guessing it's the same author and I could be wrong:

From the WUWT comments

Most of the people commenting were not quite as impressed as Anthony Watts. Had they been asked, most probably would have suggested to Anthony that it was going a bit too far, even for WUWT. Although they don't complain about Tim Ball's fanciful if paranoid conspiracy theories, so maybe not.

Mark from the Midwest had a more mundane explanation for the cattle cycle:

August 16, 2015 at 11:10 am
If you look at the cattle price graph, above, you can see that the peaks are related to periods of higher fuel prices, 79 end of the Carter Years, 91, Kuwait and Desert Storm, 2005 Katrina, et al. Cattle price fluctuations have always been tightly linked to the cost of production inputs, particularly diesel. So it’s odd that the position of two very large planets should be so closely linked to the cost of diesel fuel.

Steamboat McGoo wasn't about to comment on the astrological component, except for the astrological circuit diagram:

August 16, 2015 at 11:25 am
Can’t speak about planets and orbits with any authority, but the the circuit shown is either incomplete or makes no sense at all, and the explanation of transistor operation, bases, emitters, collectors, and vacuum tube details and theory of operation are infantile and often … confused.

ShrNfr was vaguely sceptical about it, but a fake sceptic when it comes to climate:

August 16, 2015 at 11:29 am
This sounds a lot like Post Hoc Ergo Propter Hoc to me in a number of areas. Of course, if you can distill this into a thing that will make predictions and those predictions are validated, you are doing a lot better than all the GCM models flying around.
The hypothesis that the solar magnetic field effects the temperature of the earth seems to be not disproved, but beyond that I think that there is a need to formulate a prediction model (even if only on a statistical basis) and then test against the future. Color me agnostic till then on the J-S effect.
“Truth is what works.” – William James.

joelobryan is boasting about how he can't tell real science from pseudoscience:

August 16, 2015 at 3:21 pm
40 years ago, when I was in the 9th grade, I had football coach teaching the health class I was in. He taught us about biorythms, like it was established medical-physical fact. We all unquestioningly lapped-it-up since it must have been true , coming from our teacher. Pure bunk presented as established incontrovertible fact. The 1970’s was a decade full of BS pseudoscience. Society and societal norms were in turmoil after a dozen years of sexual revolution, anti-war activism, declining family values. People were looking desparate for meaning in their lives.
I can just imagine that is what is happening in today’s high school biology and ecology classes vis-a-vis climate change alarmism. The 2nd decade of the 21st century seems to also be a decade of pseudoscience. Social norms are in turmoil and people are searching for some mystical meanings, hidden from view, in our short lives. Biorythms in 1975. Climate change-Save Gaia with carbon taxes in 2015.

M Seward explains that he would take astrological science over mainstream science any day:

August 16, 2015 at 3:43 pm (excerpt)
I agree to a point that the article is a bit like trail mix but then again trail mix is good for you when you are on the trail, certainly better than the peanut butter and jello sandwich that mainstream climate science is serving up.

Weird, really weird. But, come to think of it, don't WUWTers realize all seemingly random events not explained by traditional horoscopes are caused by asteroid perturbation effects? For $100 I'll provide personalized corrections (cash only, no returns). Sad to be reminded time and time again of those with such skewed intellectual capacity controlling very visible aspects of important public discussions.

I have forgotten more electronic theory than I care to contemplate but that circuit diagram looks like complete nonsense to me. Then again I could be mistaken as it is meant to be an analogue circuit of planetary cycles affecting things on Earth. This theory of planetary cycles of course is complete nonsense so perhaps it is a true representation!Bert, B. Ap. Phys.; P. P. E.; C.W. Y.; AAP; BBC; and to many more to quote.

"It is demonstrated that the fundamental economic cycles of the world are based upon the cycles of the planets as is the timing and magnitude of the sunspot cycle and the also the changes in the earth’s climate which are at the foundation of the world’s economic cycles." Astro Boy

"I don’t necessarily agree with the conclusion this publication... [but] I thought it might make for an interesting and entertaining discussion" Watts

And this is why WUWT is only of psychological interest, in the Lewandowskyian sense.

"Brian Johnston has been involved with mysticism for over forty years. He has studied with the Rosicrucian Order and attained the Twelfth Degree and became an Illuminati of the Order and has also been a practitioner of the Toltec system since 1969. He began studying Don Juan and Carlos Castaneda at that time and has applied the principles associated with this work since then. He is also an expert astrologer and became widely known around the world for his work into astrological research. In this regard he was able to demonstrate a statistical link between the aspects of the planets and the rate of earthquakes on the earth. He has published many articles in the International Astrologer and in Horoscope Magazine. He was a member of the International Society for Astrological Research for many years. Brian is also an advanced amateur astronomer and has been president of the Pine Ridge Astronomical Society. He was also Master at the Rosicrucian Pronoas in Peterborough, Ontario, Canada."

Anthony'd run out of freebies is my guess. It's only the second of two articles in the past 24 hours and the third in two days, and the other one was an Eric Eugenics Worrall bit of huffery puffery fairy floss. For someone who usually needs to churn out somewhere between 3 and 8 articles a day to keep his visitor numbers up, that's not many.

If he can't get any more contributions he'll have to resort to digging up a press release or two, to "claim" scientists don't know nuffin'. Or, heck, he might actually write something himself - which would be a sign of true desperation.

Of course he could recycle something he's printed before. His readers rarely notice when he does that from time to time.

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All you need to know about WUWT

WUWT insider Willis Eschenbach tells you all you need to know about Anthony Watts and his blog, WattsUpWithThat (WUWT). As part of his scathing commentary, Wondering Willis accuses Anthony Watts of being clueless about the blog articles he posts. To paraphrase:

Even if Anthony had a year to analyze and dissect each piece...(he couldn't tell if it would)... stand the harsh light of public exposure.

Definition of Denier (Oxford): A person who denies something, especially someone who refuses to admit the truth of a concept or proposition that is supported by the majority of scientific or historical evidence.
‘a prominent denier of global warming’
‘a climate change denier’

Alternative definition: A former French coin, equal to one twelfth of a Sou, which was withdrawn in the 19th century. Oxford. (The denier has since resurfaced with reduced value.)